Facebook is reportedly pouring resources into research that would potentially allow it to analyze encrypted messages without actually decrypting the data, so that it can serve up targeted ads based on private communications. The technique is called homomorphic encryption. Should users of WhatsApp, the secure instant messaging service owned by Facebook, be concerned? WhatsApp boss Will Cathcart says no. WhatsApp is popular because its end-to-end encryption scheme renders messages unreadable by anyone outside of the sender and recipient. So even if the data is intercepted, it would just be a bunch of garbled text to the hacker, who would need a decryption key to make sense of it all. Homomorphic encryption, on the other hand, is supposed to make it possible to analyze encrypted data without exposing it. Microsoft says it is actively working towards standardizing homomorphic encryption. Meanwhile, a paywalled report by The Information claims Facebook is hiring artificial intelligence researchers (including a key individual from Microsoft) to study this area, and suggests this would allow the social network to target ads at WhatsApp users based on encrypted messages they send and receive.

We're not pursuing homomorphic encryption for @WhatsApp. I've been asked this before (link below). We should be skeptical of technical claims that apps like ours could see messages in "good" cases only. That's just not how technology works. https://t.co/Y55p25QmR8 https://t.co/mZgNYyorkm

— Will Cathcart (@wcathcart) August 3, 2021

Will Cathcart, head of WhatsApp, says this is not happening, at least as it pertains to the instant messaging service. "We're not pursuing homomorphic encryption for @WhatsApp. I've been asked this before. We should be skeptical of technical claims that apps like ours could see messages in 'good' cases only. That's just not how technology works," Cathcart wrote on Twitter.